Meeting discussionsStart with a topic.

Um there there was um as far as the traffic, I think, you know, I can maybe lean on David a little bit and their engineers for how that's going to work. Um, as you know, as Rusty said, I mean, there is there is a um, you know, it's it's kind of hard to define now because it will be reviewed by the county and the city and and everybody to see if any changes need to be made as far as the timing of the light, traffic flows, where the entrances are, if one of these entrances must be turned into a right in, right out to avoid, you know, slowing proposed traffic flows. So a lot of that typically in these situations we you know lean during lean on during the permitting process because that's you know they they generally have some comments to the plan and say hey we think this you know this might be a safety issue you have to change this we have to do so a lot of this is driven by G dot and Cobb County when we do get into planning but I don't know if you guys have any comments to to add to need to swear her. Why don't you do it? Sorry, we've got a non- attorney that needs to be We got to get sworn in. Okay. Make sure we're doing it the right way. And then when you're finished, I think Miss Hines had another question, too. But I'm just I want to get some comfort level with the impact that this is going to have on the on the neighborhood there from a traffic perspective. That seems to be the number one concern and uh volume and safety and how we're dealing with all that. And I I agree, Mr. Mayor, that was what we heard at the at the planning commission meeting was that, you know, this sort of parade of horribles that's going to happen if this is approved.

You don't want to see them. The number of accidents there are huge. It It's one of the most dangerous intersections in Cobb County. I'm you have probably heard things about this intersection before. Um so our safety is a big concern. Um and our home values were concerned about that. Although 700 800,000 is not where I would be able to go either. So, but um because of the traffic we and and and the other issues, we believe it could decrease our home values because nobody will want to come down there. So, that is my short presentation. I appreciate your your um attention and I don't know if you want to ask any questions or anything, but I appreciate it. Thank you. Sean Murphy, 3282 Lee Street, Forest Hills. Um I think my uh I'm generally in support of this uh project and I think uh when you look at the site um there's a medical office building across the street and for some of the same reasons she just said she's concerned about traffic. Well, if we don't zone it residential for 13 town homes, what's it going to be? It's going to be something commercial. that means it's going to be another retail building or an office building or something that's going to generate far more traffic than 13 town homes would. So, I would argue actually that town homes is probably the least amount of traffic you're going to get if you develop something on that corner. Um, the other thing is it's it just makes sense as a step down zoning. We're going from office, we've got a daycare, we've got a fire station, and then all around it, we've got fairly high density or moderate density uh very small lot residential developments except for the one house that's to the north. And so this these town homes, which in a town home sense, it's not even a very dense town home development.

And I probably gotten a little bit out of my lane, so I'm going to defer to Kendra and see if she has. KJ, you designed the site and I'm guessing this is not a, you know, it's not a traditional intersection. Tell me tell me how the traffic is going to move, how many extra cars you're anticipating there, how there this area can handle it if it can. I just I want to get a comfort level and and I don't have it yet. Yeah. Yeah. Good evening, mayor and council members. Um Kendra Lewis for the record. Um I so I'm not an engineer but I work closely with the engineer and the architect. Um so my title is a senior permit manager. I am involved heavily in the due diligence entitlements permitting process and all the way through construction. So, um, myself and my team have probably already spent 40 to 50 hours, um, doing preliminary research for this site. Specifically, we've spoken to all of the city, county, and DOT stakeholders and sent them this preliminary plan or some iteration of it. Um, and so, so first, the traffic study. Um Chick-fil-A has not done their own traffic study at this point. We would want the approval tonight in order to proceed with that. Traffic studies are um a big expense. Um sometimes they could be five figures. So that's not something that we've gone through with yet. But um we have reviewed the previous traffic study done by Aerys which is what um in part this this was designed around. Um also we have taken into account DOT standards. Um so as mentioned South Cobb Drive is a DOT roadway. So that's where we will have we'll have an access permit through DOT for the South Cobb entrance. And then for the Oakdale road entrance, that will be the city and the county.

I got to read handwriting and try to pronounce it right. That's not an easy I got kind of doctor's handwriting on there as well too. But hopefully, you know, y'all get adjusted to seeing my name on there. But I want to say thank y'all. Uh, good evening. My name is AJ Hearnen once again. And um, I'm here speaking in regards to the same thing my colleague, a fellow member of this community has concerns on. Um, across the country, communities are raising serious concerns about these automated license plate readers. Flock being one of the leading provider of these types of automatic license plate readers in our communities and a lot of concerns in terms of how this data is retained, how it's shared, who has access to it. All these concerns are hypothetical. Officers around the country, let me hold it up here like this. Including here in Georgia, have been disciplined, fired, investigated, or arrested over alleged misuse of these systems. Block has responded by strengthening its safeguards. But some of these protections, including its audit assistance program, were previously optional. Our civil liberties should not depend on the policies of private companies. And simply replacing Flock doesn't solve the problem. Other companies provide the same technology. Meanwhile, public safety agencies are adapting adopting dr, pardon me, drones, facial recognition, AI, assisted emergency communication, and other technologies faster than communities can meaningfully debate their use. Smyrna itself has substantially expanded its public safety technology infrastructure with license plate readers, cameras, and drones. I believe public safety should be rooted in peace, prevention, community empowerment, and accountability. Public safety institutions should be accountable to the community, not place the community under increased surveillance without our meaningful participation. If Smyrna believes these technologies are necessary, then demonstrate that to us. How many cases has flocks solved? How many people or stolen vehicles has has it helped to locate?

Next, for our property and evidence remodel for police, this is an area where they keep evidence, which is very important to be secure and safe and clean, and they have a lot of lockers that are in a complete state of disrepair that are irreparable right now. So, we're just helping to improve that area, make it a more efficient area for them to use and a secure area for them to store um evidence. For public works, they have several here. Traffic sign and striping improvements. This is actually a uh combination of a few older projects that they put together. This is just to help us to comply with Federal Highway Administration regulations, update pavement markings, improve safety, replace signage, things like that. And then traffic signal improvements. Uh again, kind of speaks for itself. This is outdated traffic signals, LED lights, cameras, things like that. Conducting studies as well. So we go down there. Backflow testing and replacement. This is to make sure that our water's flowing the way it should with no contamination. Uh public works restroom edition. We have a lot of public works employees that are currently all sharing one bathroom and just making it a very bad situation over there. So we are uh certainly want to help them become more efficient and uh not have to work in in those kind of conditions. I mentioned green energy projects. This is mainly used for some of the work that we're doing with Georgia Power. This is collected from a specific revenue source, which is the street light fee that some that residents see on their property tax bills. As we go down to water heater there, water heater replacement, we're wanting to make sure that we're not only replacing water heaters after they bust and flood entire buildings and then cost us way more money.

And that's approved. 70. And then item D is the item that we added, which is closing King Street until keeping King Street closed to vehicular traffic until further notice. Uh, but available for food trucks and that type of thing for festivals. May I have a motion to approve item D? So moved by Mr. Lley, second by Mr. Pickkins. Everyone, please vote. And that's approved. 70. I'm really glad we did that, y'all. That that needs to remain more pedestrian friendly like it's been that there's so many people coming to our downtown. So, good good thing we did there. Item 10 is the consent agenda. M. Robinson, can you please read the consent agenda for council approval? Yes. Item A, MIN2026-161, approval of August 3rd, 2026 preconsil meeting minutes. Item B, Min 2026-163 approval of the August 3rd Mayor Council minutes. Item C, authorization 2026-104, authorization to amend the previously approved road closure for the Smyrna Public Safety Foundation in Vineyard Wine Market Jazz Under the Stars event on Saturday, November 7th, 2026 to include the closure of King Street from Bank Street to Steven Street in front of City Hall. Thank you, Mr. Robinson. Do I have a motion to approve the consent agenda? So, move by Mr. Lindley, second by Miss Hines. Everyone, please vote. And that's approved. 70. We're now to the citizen participation uh portion of our meeting. Uh item 11 is public comment. We have three citizens here to speak. First is Stefan Becker, 1513 Roswell Street Southeast in Ward 3. Thank you. You uh pronounced my name correctly the first try. It's always appreciate that. Um so, Mayor Norton and members of the council, um on December 15th, 2025, this council called a public hearing before reszoning half an acre for one house. It called three more before letting restaurants pour beer. It called none before approving 154 cameras, a surveillance trailer, two drones for the next 10 years.

I think it tells kids that this is a world that's extremely dangerous, extremely violent and certainly it can be. I don't want to downplay dangers to uh communities, but at the same time, we know that it is in fact uh statistically we're actually seeing a major decrease in crime across the country. Um we if we don't support helicopter parenting, it is not a healthy way to to parent children. Um, we don't want to see community helicopter parenting, so to speak, where children feel like they have to sell their privacy, uh, to remain safe, to believe that we have to have cameras on every corner, massive numbers of cameras on every corner, um, to, you know, to prevent themselves from being harmed when, you know, we need to rely on our actual community, our first responders. And I think there's other ways we can invest these massive amounts of money in our first responders that are better, more holistic, and actually support um, our community more effectively. Um, so yeah, I would recommend the recommendations. uh excuse me, I would support the recommendations of the the last two speakers um very very much and I appreciate you all taking the time to uh hear me out. So, thank you. I appreciate you all being here uh to share your concerns and feedback. You know, we take your concerns seriously. Um we understand our responsibility ensuring technology is only used by authorized personnel strictly for legal use. So, thank you for sharing your thoughts. We always welcome concerns of the public and appreciate you being here tonight. That's the last public speaker. Is there anybody else that didn't sign up but wanted to speak tonight. All right, seeing none, we'll go to ward and staff reports. We'll start tonight with Mr. Ricky Oglesby. Yeah, amazingly I have nothing today. [laughter] All right, he yields. Mr. Gold.

In addition to that, uh, I'd also like to point out, um, that there will be a significant property tax increase here. Um, as a vacant parcel, the total tax bill is right around uh with our proposed development, it'll be north of the 700,000. I'd also like to point out um why I think the Highlands View Town Home uh residents uh will appreciate our development, which brings me to our second profit condition, which is to pay for a traffic signal along Highlands Parkway and Lake Ridge Drive. Now, I want to make sure we're all on the same page here. This traffic signal will directly benefit the Highlands View Town Homes. It is right at this intersection where the circle is. Uh it'll benefit uh the properties along Lake Ridge and it will benefit uh the Highlands Grove offices across the street. Concerns, you know, over the last months have been brought up regarding this intersection. Uh and we're doing everything we can to demonstrate uh that we want to be good neighbors here uh and pay for this traffic signal. There's a few things uh I want to address headon uh before I open it up for any questions at the work session last Thursday. Uh I was asked um if we've addressed any of planning commission's comments and the answer is yes. Uh one thing that was brought up was noise along Highlands Parkway. And to address that, we'll be installing higher rated STC windows along that facade. Oh, and by the way, the front setback variance that we're requesting um will help alleviate any of those noise concerns. And in addition to that, when looking at our front setback variance, uh this request aligns with the existing conditions along Highlands Parkway. Um it's more of a function of the zoning designation that we're targeting, but you'll see setbacks for most of these buildings and parking from the street.

Mr Lindley second by Mr Welch all those in favor of tbling this to March 3D please vote that's approved unanimously 60 uh we'll revisit this on March 3rd item e these next four I believe are um contract for uh security cameras for the downtown and other areas first one is item e approval to award the purchase of genitech central database servers to net planner in the amount of $3,182 on Georgia State contract 99999 dspd 0000 172 d012 to be paid from the 2022 spls downtown and splash pad projects and authorize the mayor to sign and execute all related documents Mr bennon any background please yes sir the city has several upcoming projects requiring a new video management and access control system as the current system has reached full capacity and cannot be expanded after evaluating various options the IT department has determined that the jentech platform is the optimal solution for integrating the city security cameras and door access controls into a unified centralized platform thank you Mr bennon any discussion right I'll have a motion move to approve by Mr Oglesby second by Mr Lindley all those in favor please vote and we're having difficulty again everybody in favor please raise your hand and that's approved unanimously thank you item f approval to award the purchase and installation of security cameras and access control systems for the Village Green Downtown playground and restroom facility to net planner in the amount of $645 4720 uh on Georgia State contract 99999 D SPD 0000001 72-12 to be paid with 2022 spls downtown project funds and authorize the mayor to sign and execute all related documents Mr Bennett any background please yes sir after review net planner was chosen by Parks and Recreation and it to facilitate the install of cameras Access Control doors and lock Hardware at the Village Green playground restroom facility using State bid pricing any discussion on this item pretty straightforward I'll entertain a motion move to approve by Mr G by Mr Oglesby second by Mr G all those in favor please vote yall sound a l like I guess we'll do it by we'll do it by hand again all right and that's approved unanimously okay item G approval to award the purchase and installation of security cameras and access control systems for the riverline park splash pad to net planner in the amount of 69,900 $ 69,6 19394 on the same Georgia State contract mentioned in the previous item to be paid with 2022 Spa Splash Pad project funds and authorize a mayor to sign an execute all related documents Mr Bennett background on this one please yes sir this

We know the traffic lights are horrible there. Yeah. Listen, we can't have people drive yelling from the audience. We're going to keep an order in here. We're going to get some answers and appreciate everybody's passion. I I think this is this is exactly I mean when when Cobb County and GD GDOT look at this and if they see something because it has to operate at a certain level of service the traffic. So whatever that is ABCDE EF I think is how they grade it. And if it does not operate at the same or better than what it does today, they will require traffic improvements somehow. whatever that entails, whether it's additional lanes, whether it's another left turn lane with an arrow at the light, whether it's longer timing. I mean, they will do that analysis. I I understand. Yeah. I just feel like we're I feel like that analysis should be done. And hear me. I love Chick-fil-A and I love what you all do and you're a great community partner and I represent the people that are here that have spoken that live there and they they deserve to be able to look at a plan and say this is how many this is how this is going to work and this is where the um if there are improvements this is where they'll be made to make their lives easier that live right next to it or or not change their quality of life. I I don't know. I I don't usually get this um uh I don't usually speak this much from this seat on a zoning, but I do feel like it's a little bit backwards. I feel like y'all have come up and said, "You know what? It'll it'll be okay because we'll figure it all out." But but there's been there's no nothing has been presented to me yet tonight to tell me.